I was born in the Show Me State, which I like to think of as the Barefoot State, and spent my early developmental years there. This is why I know the difference between a mosquito, a tick and a chigger. Gotta love those formative years.

I attribute my love of reading to going barefoot, which is absolutely delicious. I still do it today. But, barefootedness has its peril. Its name is nail. If there was a rusty nail anywhere in the Missouri Bootheel, my early stomping grounds, well, I stomped on it! Summers were happily spent between the pages of a yummy read with one foot or another propped on a pillow. There are worse tribulations.

Later, I gravitated to the Windy City and its finer suburbs. This is where I fell in love with all things train. I had more than a few rides on the rail to visit my Missouri Grandmother. Come to think of it, all of my early When I Grow Ups I Wanna Be had to do with transportation. I wanted to be a pilot until I went up in my uncle's four-seater. The little cows were really cute, but the vertigo was icky! I wanted to be a steamboat captain (Thank you Tom Swayer and Tug Boat Annie!), but refer to dog-paddling below. I wanted to be a race car driver, but I'm too claustrophobic to be strapped into such an itty, bitty, metal container bolted to hunks of rubber. Motorcycle racer. Yeah. The wind, the speed. Oops. The skid, the gravel. The legs looking like yesterday's roadkill. Wait! Aha! I could create characters... in stories... who could do all these things and more. A writer is born!

I credit the Girl Scouts with my ability to float. It took two weeks of camp in my 4th grade summer! I'm a champion floater to this day, but still lack the coordination that dog-paddling requires. That tells you all you need to know about my eye/hand/foot coordination. I did go on to excel in contact sports. By excel I mean that I could catch any ball anywhere, anytime, usually with my face. I moved on to handball and racquetball in my adult years. You can do a lot of crashing into walls in those sports. In fact, I think it's a requisite. For once in my life, I looked totally cool. No moss growing on me!

I've held countless jobs from working the penny candy counter in a cigar store to selling real estate. This makes my resume look like a prototype for Where's Waldo?

I married my very own tall drink of water, still the love of my life, who used this pick-up line to score that first date — “Are you that statuesque blonde I met in the office?” Webster's Collegiate Tenth defines statuesque thusly: resembling a statue esp. in dignity, shapeliness, or stillness; esp : tall and shapely. I stand 5 feet five and one-half inches tall. That half inch is very important to me. Don't mess with the half inch! Since I'm not overly tall and my legs only go to the floor, am I easy or what?

The TDOW is why I now call Canada my home and wear socks to bed from October to April. Since I actually like digging in the same trench with the guy I married (well...most of the time), it seemed like a good move. Our current household is made all the livelier by a young golden retriever.

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